Bridget's First Birthday

On Thanksgiving Day we celebrated Bridget's 1st Birthday. After we spent the early afternoon eating dinner with Nate's immediate and extended family (I think there were 50-60 people), we came back to our house to have Bridget's party. She had a hard time staying away from the presents while we were waiting for family to arrive. She got some fun toys, books, and clothes. She is a true girl because she was just as excited about the clothes as she was the toys.

I finished making/decorating her birthday cake just before midnight the night before.

It was hard to keep her away from the presents while we were waiting for family to arrive.

Here's a video of her opening some of her presents. I didn't include all of them because I didn't want the video to get too long, but it hits a few of the highlights.

My favorite part of the party was watching her eat her cake. She loved it, especially since we're very strict about what she eats and don't let her eat junk food. She ate the whole piece and was quite a mess by the end.

Happy Birthday to our beautiful girl!

What are the Chances?

Today Bridget and I headed to the mall after I got off work, and as we were getting ready to leave the mall a horrible thing happened. Maybe I'll win a nomination for the bad mom award, but here's the story.

I had just put Bridget in her carseat, and she was crabby because it was lunchtime and naptime. She grabbed the keys which I had in my hand, and when I tried to take them back she screamed. So I decided to let her hold them for a minute while I put the stroller and bags in the car. I shut her door to open the door in front of it, and then put my purse and bag on the front seat. I shut that door and was about to open her door again to get the keys to open the trunk when I heard that dreadful "click" of the locks. In the 2 seconds that all the doors were shut, she just happened to hit the lock button on the remote. I immediately started to panic and hoped that she would miraculously hit the unlock button. When I realized that that wasn't going to happen and my cell phone was also locked in the car, I started looking around for strangers that might be able to help me.

A nice woman let me use her phone to call 911. The dispatcher I spoke to told me that "they don't do that" even though I told him my baby was locked in the car. He said I'd have to call a tow truck. I was shocked. Here I am in an emergency situation and the dispatcher won't even help me. What does he want me to do, whip out the yellow pages as I'm standing there in the mall parking lot? He seriously wouldn't help me at all, so I just hung up. The woman who was trying to help me went in the mall to try and get some help from mall security.

In the meantime, I'm standing at the car trying to keep Bridget happy and trying not to cry myself. There weren't a lot of people around, and luckily some more people came to my aid as I was standing at my car crying. Another woman let me use her phone so I could call Nate and have him start heading home to get our spare set of keys. Then a man who was a tool salesman and had his big truck full of tools was able to use something to get into the car and unlock the doors. By this time, Bridget had been locked in for about 30 minutes and there were about 6 strangers gathered around my car trying to help. The mall security guy informed me that the 911 dispatcher should have called a locksmith who would have opened the car for free because a baby was inside. He was very surprised when I told him what the dispatcher didn't offer to do anything like that.

So here's what I've learned from this experience. Don't plan on 911 helping you in emergency situations. Don't let babies play with car keys unless there is at least one door open at all times. And there are a lot of nice strangers out there who will help you when you need it.

Nate's Birthday

I'm such a lazy blogger these days. Nate's birthday was almost 2 weeks ago, and I'm finally getting around to posting about it. You can tell how excited he was to be another year older from the expression on his face (well that and the fact that he hates having his picture taken).

We didn't do anything too exciting. The three of us went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner, and then Nate opened his super exciting present (a Shop Vac) when we got home. We ate cake after Bridget went to bed since she couldn't have any. I didn't want to make a big birthday cake for just the two of us to eat, so I bought a little one at Coldstone. I think Nate thought I was a little cheesy because I put a candle in it and made him blow it out after I sang to him, but it's the official birthday thing to do so I just had to do it.

Halloween

As usual, I'm a little slow to post, but here are some pictures of Bridget in her 2 costumes. We borrowed both of the costumes, and since she looked so cute in both she wore the bumble bee costume to our ward trunk-or-treat on the 29th and the pumpkin costume on Halloween. She never sits still anymore, so trying to get a good picture was almost impossible. As of the 29th, she's officially walking all over the place. If she falls, she crawls just long enough to get to something where she can pull up to stand, and then she's on her way again. On Halloween, Bridget got to show her cute pumpkin costume off at my school and then at Nate's office. That night we tried to visit as many family members as possible, but she's not a night owl so we didn't get to see everyone. Sorry to those of you we missed. Being the strict mother that I am, she didn't get any candy this year, but I'm sure she'll love it next year.